eBay has really got their work cutout for themselves this time. They have decided, as expected, that it’s time to block sellers from leaving neutral or negative feedback for buyers. Oh, and to make matters even worse they are now counting neutral feedback left by buyers as a negative when calculating the feedback score, which is sure to drop the score of many sellers. A lot of sellers have turned the other cheek when eBay has jacked up their fees, but I think this move could very well be the tipping point.
I was reading through the eBay forum and sellers are already complaining about the negative feedback they are receiving. One instance in particular occurred from a new member who was going around purchasing things at random, and then instantly leaving negative feedback. That member was obviously suspended from eBay, and the negative feedbacks were removed, but this is the type of nonsense that sellers will now have to deal with. Plus there’s always the possibility of extortion, but eBay supposedly has that under control:
If a buyer uses the threat of negative Feedback to demand more than what was promised in the item description (e.g. wants overnight delivery but only paid for standard delivery) the seller should immediately report the buyer to eBay.
If there is clear evidence of extortion eBay will take action typically on a first offense. If a buyer shows a pattern of malicious behavior, eBay will most likely suspend the buyer. If we suspend the buyer, any negative or neutral Feedback the buyer has left for sellers will be removed.
I’m not a huge fan of what they’re doing here, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see a large number of sellers looking for other alternatives.
eBay Feedback Changes Details [via Download Squad]
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Great going eBay! You have found a new low in screwing over consumers! (Not limited to them I mean in general) I want to know who was the genius who thought this up…he obviously has no idea how corrupt people can be:\
What alternatives can there be? I’m hopeful most sellers don’t leave since ebay is still a good place…
i think it’s about time. if a buyer pays on time, they have done their job. they don’t need feedback to show this. i’ve had countless times when a seller has said ‘we leave the same feedback you leave us.’ and what if they’ve been crap? you dare not complain and no other buyers know.
if a buyer doesn’t pay or something, the seller can just complain to ebay authorities (as you’d do in real life like a shop does).
If only all buyers did their job as simply as you just made it sound, it would be great! For about a year, Ryan and I ran an eBay business for a guy who did it as his living. We sold and shipped hundreds of items every single week. Just as there are bad sellers, there too are bad buyers.
To give you an idea of the “bad buyers” out there, we had those who simply wouldn’t pay, those who complained shipping was too slow when items were shipped the day of or the day following the purchase (just to try and get money back), those who made unreasonable demands, those who didn’t read the auction completely and then complained about what they received and demanded partial or full refunds (even though it was clearly stated in a listing), and the list goes on.
Now that we just sell an item or two on occasion, we don’t really run into these issues but for those who sell hundreds and thousands of items regularly like we did, you really run into all kinds of buyers who aren’t honest. After my experience dealing with a select handful of buyers who proved to be a nightmare, sellers should be able to leave negative feedback for buyers so that other sellers are warned about potential problems just as negative feedback for sellers warns other buyers.
EBAY SELLERS UNITE!!! SLAM THE BAD BUYERS!! I just went through a bad experience with a buyer who took my cell phone, used it for a MONTH, complained to ebay it didnt work, left me HORRIBLE feedback that ebay REFUSED to remove, and then gave her her money back after she sent me my phone back.
I left ebay selling awhile ago and now I come back to find I cannot leave a neg even to a bad buyer! hilarious! Do you know how many times I had threats from bad buyers years ago to leave an unfair neg (”give me a partial refund and I keep the item to since it was 2 days late!”) only to be prevented by the fear I could do the same neg on them?
I just finished talking to ebay staff and its all true! Soooo I have decided to take my newly discovered horde of collectible toys and comics from my attic and find other auction sites and methods to sell it NOT by ebay. It seems that ebay is good to stay on only as a buyer.
I have founda few sites any ideas out there?
PS ebay’s new tactic will be felt over the next few years as honest but smaller sellers who feel an unfair neg harder then the power seller who can bury it with masses of sales, leave ebay. This will favor bigger sellers who sell less collectible more available general retail stuff. In other words the Walmartizing of ebay.
Eg. I have some rare toys why sell them on ebay and take an unfair neg hit when some power seller can sell thousands of current easily available toys, take the occasional unfair hit, and keep going.
If you are a smaller seller even a few negs stands out on your account. And you cant just become a ‘big seller’ if you are selling rare stuff (ie not readily available) and you dont have a retail licnese to sell the new stuff (which every other seller would sell).
So eventually WalMart mindset will overtake Ebay and ebay stock will plunge. Right now its too early to see it but believe u me it will trickle down to the small honest sellers and they will leave in droves.
PS of COURSE most buyers are good guys and I would always leave pos feedback as soon as they paid and then shipped fast to them but if you think that there are no buyers who will not take advantage of this new policy and use it to extort more stuff or unfair refunds from honest buyers you are in dreamland. The guy I referred to abo ve later apologized to me and said “The only reason I didnt leave a neg was because you could have done the same. Your item arrived in great shape I wanted to keep it and get a partial refund from you because I saw somebody else sell it at a smaller price so I wanted to get the difference from you. sorry”—this was over the phone he obviously did not want to email it because I could have forwarded it to ebay staff.
NOW if this happened today he would have been able to hold my account ‘hostage’ in a matter of speaking. As a small seller or rare stuff I cant take a neg hit like a power seller of new generic crappy stuff…..
I guess if ebay continues to do this kind of crap than it will shutdown soon.